Are You a Viable Candidate for Dental Implants?

Dental implants are not your grandpa's dentures. In fact they are a perfect solution to the problem of missing teeth for people who are still young and active who aren't ready to have bridgework or dentures to contend with. For people who have permanently lost their adult teeth due to an accident or injury, dental implants provide a permanent solution instead of a temporary one to a permanent problem.
Most professional athletes have had an injury that has resulted in a tooth being knocked out at some point in their career. Hockey for example is an especially rough contact sport and most players have had multiple injuries to their mouth resulting in loose teeth. For them, dentures and bridgework can be more than an inconvenience; they can actually be a hazard to have inside their mouths while they are on the ice playing.

But you don't have to be a professional athlete to recognize the need for a permanent and safe solution to missing teeth and that is why dental implants have taken off in popularity over the past few decades.
If you are considering this option there are a few guidelines that you would have to meet to be considered a viable candidate including having enough jaw bone density for the implants to take root and be successful. This measurement process can be done through x- rays or even a MRI if needed so your dentist can assess your bones properly.

Another requirement is that you should be in overall good health. This process is lengthy - at least six months from start to finish - and involves three surgical procedures so it's important that you aren't in poor health before you begin the process. And finally most, but not all dentists, will rule you out if you are a smoker.

Smokers have a significantly higher rate of dental implant failure due to infections and this means your surgery won't be successful if you are a current smoker. Even if you don't start smoking until after your implants have been placed your implants can fail due to the increased damage that smoking does to your mouth.

And since dental implants are not cheap you don't want to proceed with this option if you are likely to be wasting your time and money in the process because you are a poor candidate. Expect to pay around $2,800 per tooth depending on where you are located geographically and the knowledge of your dental surgeon. Because this is a surgical procedure you will more likely than not have to have it performed by an oral surgeon and the multiple steps involved in the process mean multiple surgeries to pay for.

The good news is that patients who received dental implants in their infancy twenty years ago are still wearing the implants with no problems and report that their false surgically implanted teeth are just as strong and viable as their natural teeth.